Wednesday, August 12, 2009

Analyzing the Differences between the Two Kinds of Punches

By Al Case

If you want to be effective when learning the martial arts, you need to learn the gains and limitations of the two kinds of punches. Knowing these punches will proscribe and guide your potential combat strategies. Knowing these punches will enlighten you as as a Martial Artist and severely effect your training.

The first punch is a thrusting punch. To do a thrusting punch imagine a train running into something and not stopping. Simply, it hits, and there is no back off, and the punch goes through.

Now, the problem with the thrusting punch is...what happens to all the cars behind the train? They all collide, stack up, and become a mess. Thus, a thrusting punch, while in theory the unstoppable force, does risk becoming a mess.

Once delivered, a thrusting punch, is now entangled. The body behind the punch, unless the legs have moved the whole body forward, risks becoming unbalanced. Thrust, and you are forced to commit your body to the action, and possibly be overcommitted.

A snapping punch is the second type of punch. Imagine a jackhammer striking cement, but only impacting once and then holding off. It hits, damages as much as possible, and then retreats.

Now, the problem with the snapping punch is...not enough weight is put into the punch. The body doesn't move into the action, and so weight is not fully committed to the punch. You have your balance, but were you really effective?

Now, a thrusting punch is a strategy involving moving your body, committing it to the action, using your entire weight, and god help you if you miss because you're going to be out of place and unbalanced. The snapping punch is a strategy where you risk little, but don't always do the damage you wish to. The main point here is the fact of committing weight, a thrust punch commits weight, but takes fifty per cent of the shock back up the arm, the snapping punch gives less weight, but 95% of the weight will be left in the body of the opponent.

So we have to continuously assess which is better, the thrusting punch, or the snapping punch. Each punch has bad points and good, and you're going to have to gauge balance versus stability, commitment versus noncommitment, weight versus speed, weight left in the body versus weight backed up the arm, potential follow ups, positioning, and so on and so on. When you're done exploring all these possibilities, however, you're going to have the right punch for the right situation. - 16887

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